Today I discovered a new part of me. Well, actually, it’s a very old part, but I saw it in a new way.

This often happens when I’m journaling. I’m writing, then a thought pops into my head that I suddenly, DESPERATELY want to act on. Today, I have to pay rent. This part REALLY wanted me to get up and check if I had enough cash in my wallet, so we would know if I had to go to an ATM first. 

I am going to have to do this at some point. But, I remind this part, it doesn’t matter whether we check now or later, and actually, it would disrupt the journaling, which I’d already decided was the most important thing right now. 

I have been practicing for a while now, not getting up and immediately responding to whatever thought pops up during something I committed to focus on. 

How’s that going? …I use the verb “practice” for a reason. 

Anyway. Today, I stayed with this voice. I didn’t get up to check my wallet. I listened. I talked to it. I felt what was happening in my body. Here’s what I wrote:

As I sit with you, I feel you getting processed and my stomach starts to digest and I have to poop. There is a feeling of sadness or disappointment, like we’re giving up or failing somehow. I sit with that. Now it is more in my neck. Pulsing. A lump of tension in my throat. “What do you want?” I ask. I don’t get an answer. I place my hands gently on my neck and keep listening. 

It is very distant, and it is a young child, crying unconsolably.

I let go of trying to get an answer. Crying unconsolably doesn’t usually yield that. So I just keep my hands on it and breathe. My mind races for a solution. But when I’m crying, I just want to know someone is there. So I start repeating, “I’m right here.” 

I’m right here. I’m right here. 

I start to stroke my neck and chest, and notice how soft the skin is. I continue to remind it of my presence, while soothing myself from the outside. 

I’m right here. I’m right here. 

Eventually, we relax. My shoulders drop and my stomach settles. It starts to be able to talk to me. It is scared. It wants to do everything right. It wants to make sure we get everything done. It is panicked. 

“I understand. There is a lot to do. But there is time. And it’s not as important as being with you right now.” It shies away and doesn’t believe me. I assure it. “Being with you right now is the most important thing I can be doing.” 

I am firm about this. I know there’s s a lot to do, but I’ve lived too many days racing through my to-do list thinking that relief was around the corner to fall for this trap and let this part of me down. This part of me thinks it needs to take extreme responsibility for getting everything done and being perfect. 

I am absolutely positive that the best thing I can do is spend a few minutes soothing this tender, tired child. 

Once it knew that I really was there, and wasn’t going to leave to do something “more important,” I heard a tiny, clear voice: “I need you.” I start to cry at this vulnerable confession from a part of me that never felt entitled to say this before. It needed me. It would try to get my attention with anxious reminders, probably hoping to be rewarded for taking care of us, soothing the fear of missing something important. But the list is endless, because that’s not really what we need to be cared for or soothed.

We just need each other. A moment to breathe together. A moment to be the most important thing.

“I need you,” it said. Gently crying, I tell it, “I’m right here.” 

I woke up with a lot of anxiety this morning. It’s normal for me to feel weird first thing in the morning. I’ve written about it before. Our bodies are waking up, our minds are coming back online. It’s a pretty big transition between states of consciousness. It’s more than usual, but I also know from years of waking up with sickening, all-consuming dread, this is okay.

I remind myself of these things and breathe deeply as the thoughts and plans and worries start to come. I tell myself that it is okay to take a few minutes to just be. I can feel that my mind is not convinced, but I’m going to stick it out anyway.

I ask to be filled with all of the Love that exists out there and wants to be with me. I imagine that it is pouring into my body from above. That I’m breathing it into my lungs, filling my chest and my belly. I relax and surrender to this new energy I’ve asked to help me. 

I observe a slight shift in the balance of power. The anxiety feels like only part of what is going on rather than the whole story. I tell myself shakily that it is okay to focus on something other than the anxiety. Everything it wants to worry about will be okay. I will get all the things done. The answers will come. The anxiety is not part of the solution. All it is doing right now is making me feel bad. What I need now is patience and compassion.

Feeling more confident and connected to that compassion, I ask my body to show me the places it is holding the anxiety for it to surface and be cleared. I feel a tightness in my sternum and diaphragm, like it’s hard to breathe. It’s been there all along, but it seemed normal. I didn’t recognize it as holding anxiety that could be lessened. The path of tension reaches up my back, into the back of my neck, my throat and my tongue.

I continue breathing with compassion and let these parts soften into the Love. It’s uncomfortable. It feels a little like I’m suffocating and a little like I might throw up. I place one hand over my sternum and one under my neck, offering soothing energy and comfort. Breathing, I let them come. I feel the strength of the Love supporting me. I feel the gentle exchange between my hands and the places the anxiety is sitting. I feel movement and heat as that sick feeling starts to work its way to the surface. I allow my hands to hold it, then let it go. 

Lastly, I came to my computer and started writing. I just described exactly what was going on and what I was doing. At first, I didn’t intend it to be anything but a blank space for me to observe and then release the discomfort I was feeling. But maybe someone else could benefit from reading my process. So here it is. 

It isn’t perfect. It didn’t delete my anxiety forever. But little by little, I am getting comfortable with the discomfort, learning I can trust myself to be with anything that comes up, and ultimately, feeling better. 

May your discovery process bring you closer to peace, Love and comfort in the discomfort.

I am a recovering independence addict and know-it-all. 

I want to have all the answers, do everything on my own and never have to ask for help.

I grew up as an only child, and my parents were pretty controlling. 

So I either struggled until I figured things out myself, or someone swooped in with their agenda and took over.

There was no differentiation between being helped and being controlled. I couldn’t ask for help, and keep my selfhood.

So if I couldn’t get help and maintain my dignity and agency…I’ll keep my dignity and agency, thank you. 

And I thought I had to know everything. Love and approval from the adults in my life depended on me proving my intellect. I still feel the scars of this every day. 

So here I was, thinking I have to do it all on my own, know everything, and not let on that I can’t and I don’t, because it was too threatening. 

I was fighting upstream and burning out, carrying this heavy burden alone. 

We have an individualistic culture that reinforces this conditioning and keeps us lonely and depressed. In 2022, after a powerfully healing group retreat, my blinders came off. I could suddenly see how lonely my life was. I lived alone and I worked alone. And I live in a country that rewards those things as status symbols.

Feeling interconnected is THE NUMBER ONE THING that’s healed my depression and anxiety.

If deep down, you don’t want to receive (it’s too disempowering or scary or you feel undeserving) it blocks the flow of energy. I’m guessing you know how good it feels to give. What if you couldn’t because no one ever received?

It makes me cry to think about how much goodness and love I was blocking.

This was also the way I approached helping others. 

I was still carrying the conditioning that it was too shameful to be helped or to learn. That it somehow invalidated my ability to be a helper. I wasn’t strong or smart enough if I needed support. 

But, I also believed in the help I was giving, it felt incredible to be trusted to offer it and I was seeing the results.

This was the deep, invisible paradox of how I was living. And why I kept burning out. And why I was exhausted. And why I was unhappy.

And if I think my job as a coach is to give so hard I deplete myself, run my clients’ lives or give them all the answers, what am I really doing? Disempowering them. Trying to prove something to myself. Replicating the harm that was done to me.

It’s my job to show them their dignity. Empower them to ask for help. Uncover the wisdom their own bodies hold.

Life is so much more beautiful and easier and funner when we surrender, put down whatever baggage we think we have to hold, and receive the mysteries of life that we are a part of.

Thank you for choosing to receive this.

The more open we are to receive, the more we receive.

It’s pretty simple. So leave some room and ask for help. You deserve it.

Last weekend, I just felt…blah.

As a professional representative of “living your best life,” I get stuck thinking I should be able to engineer mine well enough to avoid dull moments. Like I’m just not working hard enough at it.

Nice try, but no. Empty space can be like a slip’n’slide for our fears and insecurities. We have one unsettling thought and then here comes a parade of eager, wet children tumbling down after it. “You don’t know what you’re doing!” “You can’t call yourself a healer!” And, “Are you even helping anyone?”

It seems absurd looking back. But from inside, it feels like an itchy sweater that’s sewn into my skin. No amount of scratching brings relief. 

These “moments” can last any amount of time. Minutes, hours, days, even years. 

I did spend years being hopelessly depressed. Maybe that’s why they can feel so intense. Or maybe that’s just how emotions work; they’re designed to seem like multidimensional portals we’re doomed to swirl around in forever. 

Anyway, I started writing a poem in the midst of this blah day. And on this blah day, the poem seemed pretty blah, too. Maybe it had one or two good lines, but it needed too much work. Actually, all of my poetry is bad. Why do I bother writing anyway? (WHERE ARE ALL THESE WET CHILDREN’S PARENTS?!)

The next day seemed to be going the way of the blah day before it. Then, suddenly, (well, after an hour of meditating, because I remembered for the 957th time to be patient with myself) the poem didn’t seem so bad and actually, the lines that needed work were coming together. And the things I liked about it were actually worth saying. The storm was passing. I watched myself weather it. It wasn’t earth-shattering, but it was pretty cool. So here’s the poem. It’s called, “The Space Between the Sparkle.”

Today 

never had to be the best day.

Not all days can be, after all.

Some are just the glue,

a mix of simple ingredients 

holding us together.

A day to lay the bricks.

A day to tend the fields.

A day to water.

A day to rest.

The minutes crawl.

The hours drift.

There are no breakthroughs,

no explosions

and no photographs taken.

The kind of day we crave when we’re too busy.

The kind of day we hate when we feel alone.

We seem to be moving backward

toward things we left behind.

We can’t see the bigger plan 

so we start to question everything.

Don’t be fooled by your perception.

The unremarkable is just as holy

as the fireworks display.

It’s the foundation,

the boring, solid backdrop

for surprise to be seen again.

The ocean reflects every inch of sky,

the blue, the clouds, the Sun.

Don’t lose hope in the space between the sparkle.

Every drop makes up the one.

I’ve built my life around avoiding cold weather. I live in LA and spend lots of time in Mexico (ahhhh 85-90 degrees of sweet, sweet humid air).

But yesterday, I realized a shortcoming of this genius plan. Winter is the time for hibernation, just ask a bear. And like the Moon, every month, my body cycles through weeks of being more energized and social, then a week of being more sensitive and withdrawn. By running away from hibernation weather, I’m perpetuating the idea that I should be ON all the time. I’m not respecting my nature.

Regardless of the body we’re in, we all suffer from exhausting standards of productivity and perfection. Thankfully, for some of us, those standards shift during “the holidays,” this mysterious period of time in November and December, sometimes creeping into the border months of October and January, where we get some grace to take time off, be less responsive and “be with family.” 

Do we really do that though? Do we really allow ourselves to rest, set boundaries with technology and spend quality time with loved ones? Or do we get a pumpkin spice latte and a tree-scented candle and continue right on being stressed and preoccupied with what’s going on in the world?

How do we actually Winter?

I think in our heart of hearts, we all just want to be cozy and safe. To get to that part of the day when we can just sit on the couch and watch TV, or be in bed snuggling up. WHO DOESN’T WANT THAT?! To let go the day, not think about what we have to do tomorrow, and just BE.

The problem is, all day long, all year long, we’re training ourselves to be…not snuggly. To be immediately responsive to every notification. To chase down every fear and worry that surfaces and get up to fix it. We stay in a state of alertness and tension, anticipating what’s next, ready to be interrupted. Then we finally get to the couch or the bed we spent all day craving and it’s IMPOSSIBLE to shut off those processes.

Do I have answers? I sure have a lot of questions. I sure feel overwhelmed when it all comes down on me and I don’t have it together. I sure feel tired and frustrated and sad when I feel far away from how I want to be.

Here’s what helps me. I don’t have social media. I don’t watch the news. I unsubscribe from things that take more energy and value than they give. When I get a text or email, I ask myself if I have the space to read it and respond before I open it. (I notice that I’m better at this when I’m not tired.) If a thought pops into my brain and it seems urgent, I take a moment to separate the thing and the sense of urgency. Is this thing really urgent, or is it tapping into my fear? (It’s pretty much always the fear one.) 

Basically, I limit the input, and I slow down. This gives me more space to feel. And then I feel safer, because the whole world doesn’t seem like a raging dumpster fire that I have to put out. It feels a little more like being snuggled up on the couch. 

I’ve been thinking a lot about how I wake up in the morning. Sometimes, I’m energized and excited for the day. Other times, there’s no amount of snoozing that can satisfy me. As a socially anxious kid going to school, or when I had jobs I couldn’t stand, I’d wake up with enormous dread and anxiety. Some mornings, I still feel the echoes of those emotions. My body remembers waking up into a life I hated. Now, each day, I am practicing waking up gently and giving my body space to acclimate, ease the transition, and imprint how I want to live. Here’s a poem about that. It’s called “Breakfast.”

What do we feed ourselves

as we warm up to waking?

Consciousness flips on, 

percolating like a coffee maker.

Bringing thoughts, 

sensations,

emotions,

fears.

All surfacing

over the embers of fading dreams.

Observe the texture of this tender moment.

Sometimes, my skin has melted into the sheets.

Deliciousness seeps 

into every pore.

Other times, 

my mind is a slip ’n slide. 

What seeks to be freed 

comes barreling down that bright yellow stripe between death and life

like a kid on the first day of summer.

A vivid rebirth, 

each time I open my eyes.

Just allow

each 

cellular 

stretch. 

Go slow, 

we’re remembering how to be alive. 

We’re learning

and learning

how to gently awaken.

How to move

with respect

for the pilgrimage we’ve taken.

Rock me awake 

like a lullaby, backwards.

Treat each crumbling eye crust like gold 

from the mines of deep rest.

Let the body tell the story of where it’s been

and where it’s going.

Ask it softly,

What do you want to eat?

What do you want to weave?

Show me the mark you want to leave.  

Paint me a memory

that feels

like ease.

I am a recovering overachiever. I no longer want to value myself based on how much I’ve done. I want to feel good as often as I can, not because I’m “productive” enough. I want to enjoy my life! I want others to be able to enjoy their lives! And I want to live in a world of people enjoying themselves. Not one where we’re all grinding ourselves down to fit some status quo.

I see people (myself, my clients, my friends, people out in the world) who are exhausted and unfulfilled. Trying our hardest 24/7 and rarely landing. Rarely permitting ourselves to just be. I think this happens for a lot of reasons. We live in a world where being “busy” is not only the default, but is praised. So there’s external pressure. But also, we keep ourselves busy because, we LITERALLY don’t know what else to do. We are INCAPABLE of relaxing. If we even dare take time away, when we get there, we sit down to “relax,” twiddle our thumbs for five seconds, and then start making plans or pick up our phones. We’re crawling in our skin and reach for ANYTHING to alleviate the discomfort of just inhabiting the present moment, as it is.

Even typing that, my stomach turns. There’s an automatic aversion to SPACE, NOTHINGNESS, SILENCE.

And yet, we CRAVE it. We’re exhausted. We live in a perpetual state of stress. Even the activity we most prefer to “unwind,” (watching TV), activates our body’s stress response. But the idea of just closing our eyes and breathing, not taking in any stimuli to give our brains and bodies a chance to decompress, terrifies us. We say we want rest, we desperately need it, and yet, we make a full-time job of avoiding it. WHAT IS THAT?!

Here’s a glimpse of it in action. What I’m noticing in myself lately, is a tendency to pile on. I tell myself I’m going to make breakfast. I find myself making breakfast while washing a couple dishes and listening to a podcast, and oh, I wanted to sweep the rabbit cage, so I’ll do that while the eggs are cooking. And when I walk over to their cage, I notice a plant that needs to be watered, so I put the broom down and go get the watering can. I need to fill it. And oh, my filtered water pitcher is empty, so I put the watering can down and start filling the pitcher. Now I’m back in the kitchen so I peek at the eggs I remember I’m cooking. 

WOW. Chaos. Exhausting chaos. Jumping from one thing to another without finishing anything. Letting my mind ramble and bounce. Picking one thing up, then setting it down to pick up another. Why? Why not just do a task? Start it, stay on it, and complete it.

Peering under the hood, I think my inner overachiever is calling the shots. Everywhere I turn, something needs my attention. Facing so many somethings, I want to get the most done as efficiently and quickly and simultaneously as possible. The more I cram into each moment, the more time I will have later. Right?

But wait, remember my tangent about how we never actually arrive at this imagined future where we relax and focus on what we want? THAT is the problem with the overachiever program. 

Letting our overachievers run amok presupposes that at some point, we will earn the ability to underachieve. All that hard work and multitasking will finally pay off. Any one else feel like they’re still waiting for that big pay day? There’s a problem with relying on this system to manage our work ethic and life satisfaction. The input and the output aren’t balanced. We’re constantly outputting and running on empty.

So I challenge you to create more balance. See if you can find moments to rest, whether it’s a whole weekend away or two minutes in the middle of the day. Instead of treating them like another space to fill, try letting it be empty space. Try balancing doing with not doing, instead of balancing doing one thing with doing another. Maybe you’ll land in being an achiever. Because for me, being an overachiever feels more like being a never-enjoyer. I’d like that to change.

I started writing about some anxiety I was feeling - I call it “Ambient Anxiety.” Sometimes, it feels like it’s about something specific on the horizon, in my case, a call I have in an hour or so, then I have to get to the airport for a flight later. But there’s also an accumulation of smaller things, lingering from the past. I lost a crystal someone gave me last night. I tried to go to a different cafe for breakfast, but found out they don’t serve food on Mondays, blah blah blah. It doesn’t amount to much, but it’s hanging out there. (Update, as I’m editing this a couple days later, none of these things still carry an emotional charge.)

And yet, that little amount of “aliveness” never really goes away. I can usually find it when I look for it. And if I look for reasons, they’re there, too. Sometimes identifying reasons brings it on stronger. Thinking about that call sends a teeny spurt of “oh god!” energy through my stomach and chest.

I can try to think my way out of the feelings. I can try to convince myself there’s no real reason to be anxious. “It’s going to go how it’s going to go. I’m prepared. I’ve done these before. I trust myself to be in the moment and know what to say.” And yet, the feeling sits there in spite of my reasoning.

I can also remind myself that there’s an energy that comes with just caring about something. I want this call to go well. I am invested in what I’m doing. I care about the person on the other end. I can more easily accept this feeling as a natural byproduct of my attachment to what I’m doing. And I can have compassion for the version of myself that has these attachments, even though there may be a more advanced, more Buddhist version of myself that wouldn’t. But I’m just not there yet.

Here’s what else I know:

1) The Ambient Anxiety does seem to come and go. It’s unclear to me if it’s always there, waiting to surface when something triggers it, or if it’s triggered anew each time by an event.

2) I can close my eyes, focus on it and breathe. This helps me feel more “in control,” so to speak. It feels better in my body when I slow down, let myself sense it and accept it.

3) I am the one deciding that it is a “bad” thing (because it’s uncomfortable) and deciding what it means - that it’s about the call or the airport. That usually feels true to me in the moment, but looking back, those individual events no longer trigger it.

4) It helps to set aside whatever stories and associations I have, and be with the sensation itself.

“Okay, I’m noticing a tightness in my chest. It feels like my breathing is constricted. There is a warm pulsing around my heart. There is a concentrated tension in my forehead. When I bring my focus to it, the pulsing in my chest seems to intensify. My head feels heavy. Numerous thoughts compete for my attention. My stomach feels full, there is a churning energy that rises and sinks. My shoulders feel heavy. There is a wide, achy expanse across the middle of my back.”

5) When I take the time to patiently and non-judgmentally inventory the sensations I’m experiencing, one by one, as they come to my attention, they seem more manageable. I can be aware of them without fearing their impact.

6) There are things I can do to shift how I’m feeling (like writing about it, talking to someone about it, or channeling it into a physical activity).

Here’s what helps me most with Ambient Anxiety: naming it, observing the sensations it produces, and reminding myself it’s a sign that I care and am alive, even when I can identify other stories and explanations.

It can be helpful to list the stories, but it’s more helpful to set them aside and focus on the feeling itself. The stories always change. One day, I link my Ambient Anxiety to a phone call, the next, it’s needing to do the dishes. In a year, you’ll have 365 different stories, most of which will be behind you and won’t trigger the feeling anymore.

Working with your relationship to the feeling is where the magic is. I’m personally not expecting to wake up tomorrow without any attachment to life or feelings or events or people, so it’s unrealistic to think I won’t experience it.  Any time I can be that honest with myself and that connected to reality as it is, I feel more grounded, more self-trusting and just, better. I hope anyone reading this also feels better about their Ambient Anxiety. Bye for now…

I often find myself 

bouncing from track to track,

never letting the train take me.

Hovering over the controls, 

unsure which knob to turn.

The choice I don’t realize I’m making 

is to stay above ground.

To avoid digging in 

and getting my hands dirty.

I want to be covered in mud.

But not here. And not like this.

Someday.

For now, I’ll keep carrying this shovel, 

in search of just the right spot,

wondering what it would feel like

to move Earth.

To give birth

to raw pursuit.

Who would I be on the other side?

What has to die

for Life to find its way through me?

There’s freedom in joining the tide.

You can rest your head

cuz your Soul 

is rooted.

Control is fruitless,

It steals your Juice-ness.

So close your eyes and take a bite. 

We’re here 

to be 

ALIVE.

Even writing this, I found myself caught between possibilities. Trying to imagine which word would land with an imaginary reader. Just up in my own head with ghosts. Truth is, I have NO IDEA. And no amount of grinding my gears will make me know. There are times when careful planning and minding the details are essential. But many more times, I’m driving myself crazy, pouring out energy, wrestling with the 2%, thinking it’s going to make or break the other 98. The pursuit of perfection leaves us burnt out and discouraged. Sometimes, we need a break. Sometimes, we need to let time offer perspective. Sometimes, we need to just decide it’s done and move on. But it’s easy to flail around in the frustration loop. It seems like complete satisfaction is just one forceful brain-rack out of reach. That’s exactly when it’s time to put it down, stand up, and be done. Maybe for now. Maybe for ever. I feel it right now as I type. I’m tired. My brain hurts. But the mystical Perfect Blog Post is just one sentence away! Nah.